#nonrealisation

Experiential avoidance (Hayes et al., 2004) can be distinguished in synthesis, personification, and presentification. In avoidance of synthesis, survivors as ANP or EP avoid including particular perceptions. For example, dissociative parts may believe “I do not have breasts”; “That never happened”; “I do not feel anger.” When they avoid personification of what has been synthesized, they may say “These breasts exist, but they feel as though they are not mine”; “That happened, but not to me: It happened to someone else”; or “That anger exists, but belongs to that other part, not me.” Avoidance of presentification, which includes failures in synthesis and personification, might lead them to say “Since I do not have breasts, or they are not mine, I do not need to have mammograms”; “Whether I was abused or not, it has no impact on me in the present”; “I am not responsible for hitting someone because anger doesn’t belong to me.”

Recounting an experience to ourselves and others only once is often not sufficient for adequate realization. For example, therapists may need to remind themselves frequently that they must respond therapeutically to certain patients when they are inclined to do otherwise, and be responsible for engaging in practical action as an inherent part of this realization. The fact that we need to remind ourselves or talk repeatedly about unusual, difficult, or stressful events (to recount our reality), highlights the fact that personification is not always an easy task. And as with all forms of realization, it takes more mental energy and efficiency to personify experiences when they are outside the range of our normal experience or when they are overwhelming.

Survivors as ANP are often not able to fully be in the moment either, because they are avoiding internal and external reminders of trauma, again resulting in difficulties with synthesis. When intrusions of traumatic memories (and EPs) occur, their ability to be present becomes more limited. When survivors cannot tolerate certain stimuli, such as a feeling or memory, or the sight of someone who reminds them of their perpetrator, they will not be able to include these in their core and extended personification and presentification. Instead, these stimuli are avoided and survivors will engage in substitute actions to continue the avoidance: This is nonrealization.

Serious forms of nonrealization not only occur in individuals and families, but in society at large. For example, there is much outrage expressed that abuse happens, but there is little treatment accessible to survivors, even though we know that childhood abuse often has devastating and lifelong consequences. Our society seems to have a depersonalized awareness in which people can feel comfortable in being aware enough to acknowledge a problem, but not to the degree that they demand that difficult and complex social and interpersonal changes be made. Thus on both individual and social levels there is often virtually no support for survivors to realize their devastating experiences. As Van der Hart and colleagues noted, “In fact, there is often enormous pressure from perpetrators and families to continue the pattern of dissociation and denial that characterizes collective nonrealization” (1993, p. 175; cf. Herman, 1992b).

The literature on DID often mentions the existence of a so-called “host, ” the ANP that is “out” or in executive control most of the time (Braun, 1986; Kluft, 1984a; Putnam, 1989). It has also generally been referred to as the “original” personality. However, in tertiary structural dissociation no such original personality exists, nor is the host a nondissociative part of the personality. Instead, the personality is divided in two or more dissociative parts, one or more of which may be considered the “host.” We prefer the term ANP, because the host has the function of living normal daily life, and has not, or not fully, realized the traumatization. Some DID patients may have several dissociative parts which have key positions in daily life, and therefore could be called “hosts, ” even though they may not be in executive control more often than others.

In some patients, several dissociative parts may form a social “façade” that attempts to hide many deficits and overt evidence of DID (Kluft, 1985). Lena had ANPs like these, all of whom had slight variations of the same name, and who functioned as a team to prevent others from becoming aware of the profound dissociation that existed. In others, the “host” may be an ANP with features of EP(s), resulting from early and extensive neglect and abuse that precluded the formation of parts that only involve action systems of daily life, and that thus are not “contaminated” by action systems of defense.

Most often, the “host” has some recognition of other parts of the personality, although a degree of amnesia may be involved. However, occasionally, the “host” does not know about the existence of other dissociative parts of the personality, and loses time when others dominate executive control (Putnam, Guroff, Silberman, Barban, & Post, 1986). As C. R. Stern (1984) pointed out, it is more often the case that the “host” actively denies (active nonrealization) evidence of the existence of other dissociated parts of the personality rather than dissociative parts “hiding” themselves from the host. This nonrealization may be so severe that when presented with evidence of other dissociative parts, the host may “flee” from treatment.

Realization is more than an intellectual cognitive action; it also includes affect and behavior that accompanies knowing that an experience or fact is real, and that it has consequences for our personal existence. We thus accept all of our experiences for better and worse, rejoice in or resign ourselves to them, and reorganize our behavior accordingly (Janet, 1935a, 1945). In a word, the beliefs involved in realization are “hot” rather than “cold” cognition (cf., Abelson, 1963). Realization is about making connections between our world and our sense of self, and changing our selves and our world as a result. In this way realization plays a dominant role in the ongoing “construction” of our personality (Janet, 1929a).

Realization runs from the mundane and practical, to ascribing philosophical and spiritual meaning to our lives. It can be instantaneous, or slowly and painfully earned over a long period of time, requiring a high mental level. Many realizations eventually involve conscious beliefs that can be verbalized. It is common for us to say, “I realize that: I must watch my expenses; I am a good person; my father is dead and can no longer abuse me; I am an adult and can be responsible for myself; my life and what happens to me has meaning.” The beliefs that emerge from realization are not instantaneous, uncritical, and simpleminded, but are well contemplated. They thus involve reflective rather than reflexive action tendencies. Such realizations promote changes in our usual mental and behavioral actions that may be quite new and different for us (see Chapter 9).

We must engage in acts of realization, otherwise our attempts to adapt to our changeable world are not well grounded in reality, and thus run a higher risk of being maladaptive. Each act of realization involves two components (Janet, 1935a; cf., Van der Hart, Steele et al., 1993). The first action is to formulate beliefs about our experiences: what has happened, why, and to whom. The second is to adapt our subsequent mental and behavioral actions based on these beliefs. In other words, we rely on what we have synthesized to construct a worldview and act accordingly.